Musings

Woo, we had hard frost on our car windshields yesterday morning! And a cool day, with highs only in the 50’s.  Last night was really decent though, with a low around 42. At that temperature, we can be fairly comfortable sleeping without any heat. We are having high winds for the next two or three days, but it’s sunny.

My friends have really taken to boondocking! The free aspect is very appealing, of course, and we’ve had our struggles with keeping their camper batteries charged up. We got a tip that the TV antenna booster sucks battery power so we turned those off and that seems to have really helped. Right now I’ve got my old solar panel with the broken glass hooked up to Jeanne’s camper but we have to keep an eye on it since there’s no charge controller, and it also can’t be allowed to get damp or wet or it’ll short out the electronics.

We are all very happy that the weather is cooperating and it’s not going to be super-hot in Moab….so we were able to cancel our expensive ($42 a night) campsite at the RV park. Four nights, that’ll save us $168!!  Yee Haw! We’ll find a nice boondocking site in the national forest, or there are a few NF campgrounds near Moab for under $10 a night. We have also decided not to go to Monument Valley, with it’s $54 a night campsite fees.  Sheesh, all that money just to get electricity……talk about a high power bill!  So now we’ll have a free day between Moab and Canyon de Chelly; we may end up at either Goosenecks State Park or Valley of the Gods. I’m leaning more towards Valley of the Gods because it’s free camping, plus it’s sort of a mini-Monument Valley. If that’s the case, we’ll have spent only $59 for campsites on this whole 5 week period of time! Not as good as my previous record, but still pretty darned good. And we’ve had gorgeous campsites without sacrificing too much comfort!!   I am patting myself on the back for being such a good Scout/Wagon Master.

I hate to admit it but with the high price of groceries lately, we are desperate for a Wal-Mart run! But there aren’t any around here, or anywhere that we’re going until early June when we get to Durango. Yesterday on the park shuttle bus Deb said “Does this bus stop at Wal-Mart?” LOL! Jeanne is going to St. George to pick up her sister Joanne tomorrow though, and has offered to shop for us at the Wal-Mart there! Yayyy!  Joanne will be with us for the next 10 days, then Jeanne & Joanne head to Kansas and Deb & I head to Durango.

I found a great rockhounding place about 20 miles from here. The info said it was an entire hill of agate, and of course we were skeptical. But it really WAS a whole hill of agate; it was terrible!!  What to take, what to leave??!  I brought home probably at least 50# of rocks and now will have to lay them all out and see which ones are the real “keepers”, and toss the rest. (Then pretty soon someone will report this location as a “hill full of agate”!!)  Here’s my best one, it’s a big one, about 5×8″.    

To find the agate hill, from Bryce Canyon City take Hwy. 12 West and turn right onto Hwy. 89. Go about 2 miles & turn right on Casto Canyon Road. (my GPS found the road).From the pavement, go exactly 2.4 miles to hill on left.